About Stephanie Kehr…
Stephanie is a seventeen-year-old dreamer, child of God, and story crafter. She began penning novels as a tender twelve-year-old and completed her book, Reaching Home, at sixteen. If she isn’t too busy dreaming up kingdoms and reciting poetry, Stephanie plans to graduate with an English degree before her nineteenth birthday. Currently living with her homeschooling family of eight, she hopes to get married one day and move to an isolated cabin by the sea.
About Stephanie’s novel, “Reaching Home”, set to release from Ellechor Publishing in June 2015…
She thought she found a place to belong, but her father’s lust for ranchland yanked her away from the ones she loved. She believed she was special, but her boyfriend ditched her for another girl. She was supposed to be born again, but God hadn’t kept His promises.
Meet Jennie Barrett.
Motherless, alone, and afraid, she’s left her heart in Durango, Colorado.
When Regan Barrett uproots his broken family, Jennie struggles to accept the little town of Hinsdale County, Colorado as her new home. Surrounded by mice, miners, tobacco-spitting weasels, and a variety of homeschoolers, Jennie wrestles to uncover a place of belonging and the untold secrets of her heart.
Follow Jennie through internal battles, unexpected challenges and near-death experiences on a journey of love, forgiveness, and the Shepherd’s faithful pursuit of His lost sheep.
Q&A with Stephanie…
Kathy asks, ” How did you come up with the title for your book? From the story line or from one of the character’s lines he may have said in the book?”
There’s almost always a theme or metaphor that I use to structure my books. Maybe it’s a saying, a letter that pops up a lot, or something that won’t leave my character’s mind. Often, my titles will follow that pattern and structure. If not, they probably have something to do with the end of my book.
Flic asks, “Do you ever mold your characters after yourself? Which ones?”
Every character I write holds a piece of me. It could be something as small as my love for chocolate, or it could be bigger—a character that relates to my emotional or physical struggles. Usually, if I model a character after myself so much that it’s obvious, it means I’m writing that specific story for me. If I purposefully turn my character away from my personality traits (leaving them with only small similarities, like that chocolate obsession), I’m probably writing the book for someone else.
Karine asks, ” If you could go any where in the world to write to get a new perspective for a location in your book where would it be and why?”
Oooh, I wish! Do time periods count, too? I’d really like to go to Indonesia, Scotland, Ireland, or England. Australia would be pretty fantastic, too, but they have a lot of poisonous creatures…
I love countryside, and couldn’t really see myself writing stories set in cities. So, I guess I’d pick one of those places because new places always spark stories, they all have awesome accents, and beautiful scenery.
Christen asks, “Which heroine do you like better, Katniss or Tris, and why?”
Believe it or not, I’ve neither seen nor read either “The Hunger Games” or “Divergent”. I wouldn’t know who to choose.
Torri asks, “I am really interested in Biblical parallels and themes. Are there any in your series?”
Yes! Biblical parallels are my favorite, but so challenging to write! Currently I’m working on an allegory of the book of Song of Solomon.
Pauline asks, “How do you avoid being distracted by Facebook and Twitter so you can write?”
Ah, Facebook and Twitter. Well, although I do have Facebook for business and stuff, (shh—it’s a secret—) I don’t actually follow any of the people on my friends list. That limits the distraction of being involved with other people’s lives via social media. If I want to know about someone’s life, I hope that we’ll talk about it in person. As for Twitter…it’s pretty uninteresting to me. Again, I use it for mostly business. E-mail is probably my biggest social media distraction. Usually I save e-mails for breaks in between writing.
Thanks, Stephanie for taking time to share on the blog today. Be sure to connect with Stephanie through her website and social media links below.
Happy Reading!
Great interview!
Thanks, Laura P! I’m amazed at how much Stephanie has accomplished at such a young age 🙂
I second. Enjoyed this. =)
Thanks, Nancy!